Minecraft Snapshot 23W31A Introduces Massive Nerfs to Villagers

Minecraft just received a snapshot for version 1.20.2 which brings changes to Diamond Ore generation, the ability to waterlog Barriers, and a change to Villager curing. It also brings a new Experimental Toggle that updates Villager trading. In addition to the balance changes, players will find a whole lot of technical features and changes in this snapshot, including new commands, function macros, persistent command history, network performance improvements, and much more.

Minecraft Villager nerfs explained (Snapshot 23W31A)

This snapshot introduces a new experimental Feature Toggle that updates the Wandering Trader and Librarian trades. You must turn on this Feature Toggle in the Experiments Menu when creating a new world if you want to test the new trades.

Librarians 

Before these changes, players could get any village enchantment from any Librarian. A novice Librarian could sell the best enchantment in the game! For some players, this felt too random and made trading feel overpowered when compared to using the Enchanting Table or searching for Enchanted Books in structures.

With the new rules, Librarians from different biomes sell different enchantments, and each village biome has one enchantment that is only sold by master Librarians.

Players will have to work towards getting the best trades instead of relying on random chance. The developers hope this makes Librarian trading more interesting and skillful, while also revealing some clues about the history of each village type through the enchantments that are sold there.

• Librarians from different biomes now sell different Enchanted Books.

• Each village biome has one special enchantment that is only available from Master Librarians with full XP.

• This means that players must visit all seven village biomes to get the full set of villager enchantments.

• There are two secret village biomes where villages do not generate.

• A player must build these villages to access their trades.

• Some enchantments have been removed from village trading and must be found in other ways.

Wandering Traders

Some players felt that the Wandering Trader had unfair prices and didn’t sell many useful items. The developers have lowered their prices, added more trades and increased the amounts available. The Wandering Trader will also now buy useful items from players, so it’s possible to help them on their journey by giving them supplies even if you don’t feel like buying anything.

• Wandering Traders now have lower prices and have a higher amount of each item in stock.

• Wandering Traders now sell Logs.

• Wandering Traders can now buy many items, instead of only selling.

Other changes

• Diamond Ore is now generated more frequently in the Deepslate layers of the Overworld.

• Curing a Zombie Villager now only gives a big discount the first time.

• There is no longer a bonus discount for reinfecting and curing the same Villager multiple times.

• Barrier blocks can now be waterlogged by players in Creative mode.

• Water cannot be placed in them or taken out by non-direct interactions such as Dispensers.

• Players will no longer be able to crouch while riding vehicles.

• Chorus Flower no longer provides support for hanging or standing blocks.

There are also some technical changes that are in the official patch notes for resource packs, network protocols and more.